Page 51 of Daddy Issues

Fall in the desert meant it could be hot as fuck during the day, but freeze your balls off at night. Today hadn’t been bad, but the chill in the air now rippled across my skin when I pushed open the door. I had a moment to wish I had that insulated flannel shirt on the ride home.

I wasn’t about to ask Kenna for it back. She’d looked too damn good with the thing wrapped around her, swallowing her whole.

The whole point in leaving had beennotto think about her. Fuck me, I couldn’t even make it to the bike without my brain turning to Kenna.

I didn’t make it far before I heard her behind me. Rapid clicks in those god-damn boots. I didn’t even need to turn to know it was her, so I kept my course to the bike.

When she’d been a teenager, before my kid was born, I could remember her chasing after us in the parking lot—so excited for a baby to be around. I hadn’t planned on my life turning out how it had, or for her to grow up to be so fucking delicious.

She caught me at the bike. “Hey, wait a damn minute.”

I swung a leg over the seat and laughed a little. “Thought Jester was taking you home.”

She pursed her lips in a pout, then ducked her head. Making me want to kiss across the freckles over her nose.

“He say no?”

Her head jerked up, anger dancing in her eyes like she’d just remembered to be mad at me. “Actually…he said if I wanted to go that route, I had to tell you first.”

“That what this is? You telling me?” My stomach tightened, my finger stalling on the ignition button.

“Are you fucking serious?” She glared at me. “He’s never been what I wanted.” It was the way she said it, the sultry, half angry slide of that last word that made my cock hard.

I couldn’t afford to do this—get wrapped up in a woman that wasn’t ready to shoulder my baggage. Kenna was loyal, smart, sexy, but she didn’t really know what she was in for with me. Hell, she couldn’t even drop a shirt off at my house without my past dancing around in the front fucking yard.

And still, I pictured her laying beneath me like that night at the frat house. Vulnerable. Unable to stop me. It was the salacious feeling that heated through me at the thought she would never be ready for.

I didn’t think I could control it.

I flipped the first switch, then thumbed the second, my bike roared to life. I could let the exhaust drown out any argument she’d give me. I was doing this for her.

“Adam.” The sound of my real name cut right through that rumble and punched me in the solar plexus. Not Puck. No, she’d called me something more intimate, stroked my desire with that one word.

I shut the bike off, my cock hard as a rock, and my breath catching. This was a bad idea, would always be a bad idea. “Come here.”

Untying it and pulling my shirt around her, she stepped off the sidewalk and to me, the creamy flesh at the top of her boots pressing against my thigh.

“I’m not what you need.” But I itched to hold her, one arm snaking around her waist and pinning her there.

“But you’re what I want.” Defiance flared in her big hazel eyes.

“People are going to have shit to say.” And I’d take care of most of it.

“I don’t give a fuck about what anyone thinks.” She laid her forehead against my shoulder, her voice muffled. “You’re an itch I need to scratch.”

I could relate. I snorted a half laugh. “Baby girl, you’ve got no idea.”

“Then show me.” She tilted her face up. The orange streetlight above the building flickered across it, making her look like some sort of desert sprite sent to enchant me.

I leaned in to kiss her before I could stop myself. Her lips parted and she tasted of whiskey, of woman, of all the things I knew I couldn’t have.

People walked in and out of the clubhouse, and someone hooted a cat call out into the night. We had an audience. Not that I gave a shit. I wanted her too bad.

She was clinging to my arm when I pulled away. I didn’t touch her. If I did, I wouldn’t be able to stop. Instead, I fisted one hand in the back of my flannel and kept my other palm flat on my knee.

Her fingers were busy on my shirt, down my chest, then she flattened her palm against my swollen cock through my jeans. Good God, it felt so good I rocked my hips against her touch.

“Kenna.” I grabbed her hand to move it, but pressed it tighter against me when she nuzzled my neck, like she knew that was the one thing that would send me over the edge. I closed my eyes against the rush of desire. “You should go inside.”

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